MFM report overdue

Here is my MFM con report... Sorry that it took me so long to write it up... I've been a little busy and stuff. I haven't even unpacked fully yet. :/ For more read below!

Friday:Friday morning I drove out with stargazer79 and my brother. We moved out roughly around 12am. I didn't get much sleep the night before and on Thursday after work I was doing some last minute shopping. I found a good plastic container for transporting my fursuit, or at least I thought so. It would've been great if it was just me and Gazer driving up, but we had dook with us and the large container in the back did not really make it safe... So we had to unpack the suit and take it pretty much as is. On the way out to MFM we did stop by a local Walmart to pick up some road drinks and also to try to find a power cord for Gazer's mp3 player which they didn't have... We first were thinking of getting like a large garment bag for like business suits but the largest one didn't have a price tag on it and we just needed to leave so we kept on trecking. I was actually able to get a little bit of sleep while driving and Gazer drove roughly 2/3'rds of the way before we needed to switch out. We swapped out like right outside of Little Rock, Arkansas and from there it was mostly a straight shot to Memphis on I-40. We made a stop here and there for gas and stuff naturally and the last stop we made was right at a Walmart in West Memphis right before the bridge over the Mississippi River. We got some breakfast and I picked up a smaller plastic container to hold my suit. It didn't hold everything like the other one, but was smaller and didn't make it a problem for someone in the back seat which was what we needed.

So we drove over the big bridge and into Tenessee. Actually I think it was Gazer who was driving at the time and he continually said he missed one particular turn off every year and this year didn't miss the turn off. We made it to the hotel and it was like around 9am. We made some very good time. From there Ryan went off to find who he was rooming with raganzi and I couldn't check in just yet because the rooms weren't clean. So left most of the stuff in the car and at minimum got registered. It wasn't until around 12pm that we were able to check in and I wish I had been as lucky as my brother and been able to catch a nap. I stayed up pretty much the entire day, mostly as I was the one who booked the room and stuff. It may not have been the smartest thing, but it was still fun... Even if I missed out on some of the late night activities.

Mostly what I did during the day was go around to try to find who was there that I knew and at least say hi. I saw railo in the lobby, and found others like aerofox, perro & his mate foxpaws, met a new person Foz (who gazer knew who also helped us bring in stuff from the car when we got our room), and many many others... I wish I could recall all the names and I've worked and slept since then so I will appologize in advance if I do not mention your name as some of the fursuiters I met I don't even know if they have lj's and not sure of their names... I fursuited a few times, the first time to get my fursuiter badge and a couple other times just for fun and stuff. For dinner went out to chickfila with friends and even brought my friend Solus along with Foz and there were a couple of others like Gazer and other names I can't remember. I attended opening ceremonies and did get a badge commission from jessk and a sketchbook commission from growly. Other than just random wandering around hanging with friends and stuff that was about it...

Well not everything... I did attend ww_creations's wedding! :P I went in suit and dressed up with my maroon shirt, leather doublet, and everything. I went in style. :) I wished her a happy wedding and gave her a hug in suit there. She looked very pretty in her red dress and I wish her and her husband the best. I do hope to find someone to be with for the rest of my life at some point. I did try to attend isfacat's comedy show, but because of the wedding I missed that. I did try to pounce him in suit. I did happen to pounce a few people in suit and lots of my friends recognized the suit and definitely thought that White Wolf did a great job and it was easily recognizable as my character. :) *smiles*

I crashed a little and hydra_velsen arrived at the con a little earlier than he expected around 11/12pm instead of 1am like he originially thought. Though djgenki hadn't arrived which had me, Foz, and Hydra a bit concerned as he also wasn't answering his phone. So rooming arrangements were me, Gazer, and Hydra for now. Then after Hydra arrived and stuff just crashed hard... I thought of playing fursuit volleyball but just didn't have the energy as I didn't have much sleep at all and was just entirely exhausted.

Saturday:This was one of the biggest days that I had, both fursuiting wise and everything else. I got a decent amount of sleep, and was feeling better as the day before I had a little scratchy throat and that was pretty much gone. Got suited up for the fursuit parade @ 11:30am. Went about there and actually had my friend tigeronstarfire help me and he took pictures, or was it Hydra I can't remember as I do know Tiggs helped me at one point as well... *bangs head* Stupid poor memory at times... Well the parade thing was fun, but we went outside at one point instead of going through the dealer's den which kinda sucked... The heat outside wasn't too bad, but the parade should've gone through the dealer's den to let the dealers see all the fursuits... I gave my sketchbook to a few people in the dealer's den and went about fursuiting a little bit and then went out to lunch with Hydra, Calorath, his wife Lyra (who at one point I picked up in my arms in fursuit and carried her away! :P *snickers), and a few others who I can't remember their names as I believe they were Calorath's friends... We drove around Memphis some and hit into Mississippi trying to find a chinese restaraunt and did eventually find one... Hydra at one point asked for directions from a fellow driver who started driving off somewhere... It seemed kinda fishy so we didn't follow him when he drove into a supermarket parking lot and we eventually found a mom&pop chinese restaraunt... Strangely enough the guy that was "trying" to give us directions also stopped into the restaraunt and wondered why we didn't follow him... That was just creepy all around. The food was good and big portions so that was good.

We got back to the hotel and I picked up my sketchbook and commissioned another conbadge from another artist. I spoke with artist Beowolf who I also wanted to sketch in my book about what I wanted in it. I spent time walking around with friends and met up with my brother who told me all about an awesome party that I missed Friday night that jaspian & Soron (thegreenarcher) threw... Man after hearing about that party I so wished I had attended. :/ *shrugs* Ah well... There will be other parties... Actually met Jaspian who is a nice person. A very thin and lanky, kinda "twinkish", and that body type many there at the convention found him to be very 'hawt' *chuckles* I didn't really get comments like that, but neither did I dress as provocatively as he did. Both me and my brother hugged him on either side and had to say "twins, basil... TWINS" ;P Jaspian got quite a kick out of it which was the effect we wanted. Other than that I did lots of wandering around, talked with friends and things like that. Went out at one point with teirandragon & aerofox to an Arby's and after getting back got a call from Hydra that he was in the line for the pizza feed and was right close to the front of the line and sneaked into the line behind him. The pizza feed was fun and there was a big balloon fest... A cheap way to entertain furs... Balloons!!! I don't know why, but I was like totally picked on... People beating me fiercly with baloons... I got some back but man... *chuckles* It was tons of fun though! :P Teiran even teased me that video was put up on the internet with the battles that happened... I so hope that doesn't happen, but probably will anyway. *chuckles*

I did attend a fursuit greet thing which was pretty cool and also entered into the Iron Fursuiter contest. It was to test someone's balance, endurance and other things while in suit. I was a late entry and I won the first round which was a race, but on the second task which was balancing a ball on my fursuit head I lost... :/ *grumbles* They had a mixup and at first I throught I was out on the first event, but because I was a late entry didn't have my name on their list, but *shrugs* I didn't win anyway... Looks like one of the events after the balancing was doign pushups and I know I could've done that no problem. I found how to balance the ball on my head so... next year I plan on winning. During the games got to talk with other suiters and had tons of fun.

After the the iron fursuiter thing I went to laceaurora's room party and had something to drink there, not much mind you. There was a hooka there and they accidentally burned the carpet! :> I did want to go to Calorath's room party, but Hydra who was there earlier left the party as they were like smoking weed... I wouldn't have really wanted to be around that either... Have that kind of smell on my clothing and stuff. I bet before that started the party was pretty fun though. Other than that just wandered around some and mingled with lots of people. Went to bed and stuff.

Oh yea I forgot to mention that my brother's rooming arrangements with raganzi were messed up some as he wasn't able to fully commit and then ended up going the rat got other rooming arrangements and my brother ended up rooming with us. Strange thing is that Genki still hadn't shown up which was very disconcerting... :/ At one point that evening Hydra and I went out to Arby's for some food and when we got back to the hotel there was an ambulance at the front! Strange, but it looks like things weren't too serious, but I don't know all the details. Glad things were ok, though this wasn't the first time an ambulance or team of medical people would be at the con. I also went to the dance at one point and had some fun playing with glow sticks, though it seems there are some other good poi spinners...

I must learn more tricks!

Sunday:Well good thing here is that Genki did arrive, but late in the day. I didn't do too much really... I went to dealer's den and picked up one a badge I commissioned and gave my book to White Wolf who drew a nice sketch... I unfortunately didn't get as much art in my book as I really would've liked at this con, but ah well... *shrugs* One of the things that I did for the first time was do an entry for the masquerade. I got aerofox to do a skit with me... We did a round table thing trying to figure what to do for our little skit. Got with Stargazer, Hydra, Tigeron and we came up with something that we could do. We decided to do a skit about SL and the "Griefer Zone"... parodying the Twilight Zone we actually got someone I think by the name of Sonic Blue to help us out as he had a very good impersonation of the announcer... Did some last minute practice, but in the end the skit was "ok" perhaps at some point may try to do it again but try to do things better... *shrugs* May do a completely different skit next year. It was four of us on stage, me, Aero, Hydra, and Tigeron. The gist of it was that in SL there are lots of people out there who just cause trouble and I was one causing trouble and got Aero to kick Hydra's butt while he was "afk" and he comes back wondering who caused all the mess and Tigeron who is a n00b only saw Aero kick Hydra's butt and blames him and he gets chased off the stage and I laugh my @$$ off. ;) *chuckles* They didn't que the voice over for the ending but ah well... I plan on buying a dvd of the whole masquerade and everything.

Throughout this whole thing it was cool meeting other fursuiters and hopefully making friends and wish I had done a bit better swapping contact information around. I think one or two people that I met found me here on LJ like one of the huskies Jase though I think his lj name is loup_garou_wolf, and also met a fellow Louisiana fur volpe_kitsune (who specifically told me if I didn't mention her she'd cut off my unmentionables! :P *cringes*). Also wanted to mention zephyrpanthur who was a big help during the fursuit games and fun to hang with that I just met at this convention. :) This convention was like a big thing of meeting new friends which always rocks.

After the masquerade I got out of suit and went out to eat at a cool hibachi grill and went out with Soran, Jaspian, and many others that I think know Genki fairly well... I really only knew him, Hydra, Jaspian, & Soran... Some of the others seem very cool though. We rushed back and we missed closing ceremonies, but did make it back for the tail end of the ice cream social... Free icecream!!!!! :P *chuckles* After eating a little I got suited up and we had the fursuit games. It was a little bit jumbled but the games consisted of little relay races between two teams, basketball (which my team won that event), trying to pass a hoolahoop in a chain of people and fursuits make that even more trying with tails and paws that can be cumbersome... I was on Jase's team along with moonstonewind, Zephyr, Paddlefoot, and others... One of the last events was musical chairs... I did go farther than I expected, but didn't win and the 2yr. time running champ paddlefoot_wolf who people were expecting to win this year didn't... It was a fursuiter named Santa Fox. In the end it was quite fun though one person may have overheated or something and an ambulance team was brought in. I do believe they were ok, but still... :(

Oh yea and one thing I almost forgot to mention... Balloobies! :P *snickers* (You would've needed to be there to get this joke) I also nose kissed ladydeyote! :P She was wearing her fursuit and it was so cute... I think at least one or two people took pictures. Other than that had some fun playing with baloons while in suit and stuff.

After the games I went to a small room near the dealer's den where Genki was playing music and stuff. I got to snug him in suit as he hadn't had a chance at all to see my suit and loved it. I danced some in suit and even played around with glow sticks, after taking my head off mind you. I got out of suit, danced a little and partied at one of the dead dog parties. I'm not sure what Hydra or others were up to, but eventually met up and Genki was having a little bit of a problem and me and a few others including Hydra were trying to help him out. I'm not going to go into detail there, but was really concerned about him. I know he had fun at the con, but having car trouble getting down and now this... :/ *many hugs to Genki* I stayed up quite late trying to comfort him and also spoke with one of my artist friends Beowulf who my brother got to know quite well. Those two hit it off pretty well and there was a problem with the hotel internet and Beowulf had something he needed to mail to a client and my brother used my camera and to help out took a few pictures and informed Beowulf once we got back to Texas would mail him the files so that Beowulf wouldn't miss getting something to this client. I was also up late talking with Zephyr as well... Eventually got some sleep.

It was too bad this was the last day of the con and wish it didn't have to end... :/ Ah well all good things come to an end.

Monday:

The day of leaving... :( It was so sad to have to tell people goodbye. Had such an awesome time. I know I didn't get a chance to tell everyone goodbye I wanted. Hydra and Genki went for food before leaving... Semi wish I could've joined them, but we had to leave. We had a visit of downtown Memphis which was cool and we ate at BigFoot... A restaraunt themed around that large hairy sasquach. The food rawked and we all shared a deep dish cookie with icecream at the end. I got some pictures, though I feel that next year at MFM I'll have to gather up some friends and we'll have to make an excursion to this place again.

After getting food we drove home... On the way home we traded off drivers as all three of us didn't get much sleep. I believe we all pretty much drove 1/3, though Gazer did the most driving all in all. On the drive I watched some of an anime I brought Hellsing which is pretty cool about vampires and has a very neat and very devilish goodguy voiced by one of my favorite voice actors Crispin Freeman who also does Zelgadis from Slayers and Tsume from Wolf's rain. I drove some and had to drive through some rain which was cool as the rain was in Texas and we really needed the rain. Once hitting close to Dallas Gazer took the last 30/40 minutes of driving and we first stopped off at my brother's apartment and picked up his roomie Teser and had a nice dinner at Romano's.

So there ends my MFM trip.

In short... I LOVED THE CON! :) It was very fun... But if you read all the details you're really know why. ^_^